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Dr D. C. EVANS looks at some of the options open in selecting a plain‐bearing arrangement designed to operate where an external lubricant supply cannot be incorporated for reasons of environment or expediency.

Treatment for ‘Triazine’. Coatings applied by the anti‐corrosion specialists Lithgow Saekaphen Ltd, are performing a vital function for FBC Ltd, in the production of the weedkiller ‘Triazine’.

Swansea carry on … THE University College of Swansea has decided that the Swansea Tribology Centre will continue after the initial DTI support ends, which is this month. This means that the Centre must cover its costs by means of income from industry and so must, in fact, provide an independent consultancy service on tribology. Swansea will of course say that as far as its consultancy work is concerned it has always been independent, but now that it must stand on its own feet financially, it must see that it continues to build a reputation for results like any other competitive independent business undertaking.

MUCH can be written about the design of bearings. This article is intended as a basic guide in the art of non metallic plastics bearings.

WHILST reinforced plastics materials have been employed for bearing surfaces on an ever increasing scale for over thirty years, it is only in the past decade or so that they have really been accepted as engineering materials in their own right and not as just substitutes for metals.

Ball bearings engineered from polymer resins offer, it is stated, significant advantages over their steel counter‐parts in engineering design, especially where moderate running speeds and loadings are experienced. A polymer bearing also gives a far superior performance than can be achieved with a plastics bush for the same duty, yet it costs only a few pence more.

THE JET AGE of today and the Space Age of tomorrow would not be possible without the recent developments in specialised lubricants that have increased the capabilities of fluids, greases, solid films, plastics, ceramics and other specialised lubricating agents. The present and potential use in aeronautical and astronautical flight have imposed and will continue to levy requirements upon lubricants that were beyond the vision or imagination of the lubrication expert of a decade ago. This article does not intend to create the illusion that all our problems have been solved. Rather, it is intended to present the new concepts and capabilities of some of the present products and the potential of the new developments on the basis of knowledge gained through both actual use and through research and development efforts.

No matter how good the theory or how well designed and made the product, in the end it is whether a bearing works or not that really matters. That is where practical experience is indispensable.